I have to agree with the soap opera lovers on this thread. I've been watching One Life to Live for 14 years and All My Children for 13. And I'm only 24. So I grew up with these shows and characters. It's just another form of escapism, like movies or primetime series. Yes, the storylines can be stupid and riddiculous. But that's not all there is. Soaps also explore social issues....spousal abuse, prejudice, addiction, etc. Anyways, I'll get off my soap box now (pun intended). :D

I agree with this.

I don't watch soap operas regularly -- for a while I was a semi-regular Passions/GH watcher and I still sometimes tune in -- but I think they can be done quite well. One of the advantages they have over traditional 30-hour sitcoms or even hourlong dramas is that their format lends itself much more easily to exploring issues that take a long time to develop -- one example given to me was Lizzie McGuire's "eating disorder" episode versus All My Children's storyline with Bianca's anorexia. I haven't seen either of these shows so I can't back that up, but it seems pretty clear that there are some important issues that take more than one episode to properly develop and end up looking shallow when you try to cover them in one half-hour segment, and many soaps do a very good job with these. I think there are a number of soaps that have won praise and awards for their explorations on subjects like breast cancer, abortion and adoption, etc.

And then of course there are shows like Passions that are supposed to be pure escapism and that's always good too.

I think the major thing about soaps is that when they're done well, they're very very good, but when they're done badly they're really bad.

Soap operas are terrible. But I watch them anyway :p

I'm addicted to Days, and was addicted to Passions until I woke up and realized that it's B-O-R-I-N-G. I tape both every day while I'm at work, but I only end up watching Days every day. I watch Passions about once a week, because of course I'm not gonna miss anything on that one.